The faithful chorus of a single voice

  
 I have a personal cage. Very tightly woven.
 It has no door, the bars are terribly soft.
 It lay empty for a long time. Now you are there.
  
 For ages I have touched a thousand voids.
 I thought that was my destiny. Then suddenly finding you!
 If you ever open your eyes and look into my secret interior,
 you'll see only the smell of burning there. With it some embers, some ash, nothing else.
  
 I am well now in a certain way. Crying no longer hurts.
 Some pain no longer burns. As far as I understand, this is called being well.
  
 One request. Keep the request.
 Never take me back to the wounds of the past again.
 I have lived there for many, many days. And
 having lived there I know, there is only the heat of blazing fire.
 I am tired today from bearing so much heat.
  
 If I must return there again,
 if I must begin burning once more,
 then I truly will no longer have the courage to love you.
  
 I have some sorrows, personal ones.
 Those sorrows are imperishable, indestructible.
 I still cannot heal them today. I know
 they were born to stay with me my entire life.
 You need never take their burden.
 Just stay beside me, that will be enough.
  
 Do you know what has happened to me these days?
 Every day with eyes full, heart full
 carrying a wealth of tenderness, a handful of wonder
 I gaze unblinking toward your creation.
 I think, ah, how beautiful, how beautiful!
  
 I desperately want
 to stay awake beside you, sit and watch you,
 rest my head in your lap, keep myself warm…
  
 You are drawing, drawing one after another.
 Drawing cities, drawing citizens, drawing love, drawing hearts,
 sometimes hurling hatred, sometimes rebellion…what does it matter to anyone!
 …knowing this still you draw, keep drawing…you never pause,
 your brush doesn't stop, I only wait…keep waiting.
  
 I am dying of thirst…your busyness still doesn't end,
 I sit with a whole world of time clutched in my fist for you,
 when will you come…when will you come…
  
 Sometimes restless across this gray city
 I want to walk alone,
 want to cry alone…
  
 You still remain before the canvas,
 my brush screams out the story of my tears, my sorrows,
 you cannot hear, you have gone deaf, you only stay busy…
  
 When I call, the sky comes to my courtyard,
 still you don't come…from a distance greater than
 this entire sky you draw me, keep drawing me…
 I watch, weep silently.
  
 Seeing my hurt you prepare for a new painting,
 from that painting's eyes will emerge not tenderness, only pride…
  
 Standing before your canvas you understand me so much,
 standing before me you still don't understand that much, this is the sorrow.
  
 Don't think I knocked at your door, this is only my solitude's fault.
 Remember, the feelings that come one by one to your door,
 those are my purest love. There is no pretense there, no alloy.
  
 You never come to ask about my unbridled anguish.
 I want only to tell you about my dreams.
 I have some fragmentary dreams about you.
  
 Seeing you, I want to begin everything anew,
 thinking of you, I want to live a long time with you.